This disclosure relates to conductive cooling of surfaces, such as seat covers or electronics, using distributed thermoelectrics.
Heated and cooled seats are becoming more prevalent in automotive applications. One approach is to use a flexible duct mounted to a shaped foam block that forms a seat cushion or seat back. Conditioned air is blown through the duct. A fabric is supported on the flexible duct, and a perforated aesthetic cover is wrapped around the foam. Air is supplied through apertures in the flexible duct and then passed through perforations in the cover to thermally regulate the seating surface.
Another approach incorporates at least one rigid thermoelectric device (TED) arranged beneath the support surface of the foam. Air is blown across the main (e.g., cold) side of the TED to provide cooled air to the aesthetic cover. A traditional TED arrangement for seating application utilizes one or more rigid TEDs that are “off the shelf” (e.g., 25 mm×50 mm).
Covers with perforations may be undesirable. Additionally, there may be thermal losses with the above approaches.
A typical TED provides concentrated cooling for high heat flux heat sources, such as electronics. For such applications, the TED has a high packing density, for example, 50-80% TED area relative to packaging area of the assembly. The shunts are sized slightly larger than the pellets in a typical TED, for example, 110% the diameter of the pellet and 220% the length of the pellet. This configuration enables a dense packaging to maximize cooling for the TED's footprint.